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Favorite quotes

On this page, you will find a selection of quotes that I like. The page will be updated as run across new ones that fit into my life’s philosphy. The newest quotes will be at the top.

Last update: 08/02/11

“One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors.”

— Plato

“None of us has gotten where we are solely by pulling ourselves up from our own bootstraps. We got here because somebody bent down and helped us.”

— Thurgood Marshall

“Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks about changing themselves.”

— John Randolph

“Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired, and success achieved.”

— Helen Keller

“This is my simple religion. There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own mind, our own heart is our temple; the philosophy is kindness.”

— Dalai Lama

“Right defeated is stronger than evil triumphant.”

— Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

“If you don’t read the newspaper you are uninformed. If you do read the newspaper you are misinformed.”

—Mark Twain

“A true friend laughs at your stories even when they’re not so good and sympathizes with your troubles even when they’re not so bad.”

—Irish proverb

“If you see injustice and say nothing, you have taken the side of the oppressor.”

—Desmund Tutu

“No man has a right in America to treat any other man tolerantly, for tolerance is the assumption of superiority.”

—Wendell Willkie

“Let us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a President and senators and congressmen and government officials, but the voters of this country.”

— Franklin D. Roosevelt

“Those who stay away from the election think that one vote will do no good: ‘Tis but one step more to think one vote will do no harm.”

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

“To make democracy work we must be a nation of participants, not simply observers. One who does not vote has no right to complain.

— Louis L’Amour

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever does.”

— Margaret Mead

“Divorce is not caused because 50% of marriages end in gayness.”

— Jon Stewart

“First they came for the Communists,
and I didn’t speak up, because I wasn’t a Communist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn’t speak up, because I wasn’t a Jew.
Then they came for the Catholics,
and I didn’t speak up, because I was a Protestant.
Then they came for me,
and by that time there was no one left to speak up for me.”

— Rev. Martin Niemoller, 1945

“Malice drinks one-half of its own poison.”

— Seneca (Roman statesman circa 5 B.C. – A.D. 65)

“An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of this individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.”

— Martin Luther King, Jr.

“Success is like a garden with too much sun. Be careful it does not dry your roots.”

— Joan Walsh Anglund

“It is better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than to open it and remove all doubt.”

— Mark Twain

“An optimist is a person who sees a green light everywhere, while the pessimist sees only the red stoplight. The truly wise person is colorblind.”

— Albert Schweitzer

“Life begets life. Energy begets energy. It is by spending oneself that one becomes rich.”

— Sarah Bernhardt

“Taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

“The mind is like a TV set — when it goes blank, it’s a good idea to turn off the sound.”

— Communcations Briefings

“God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion. The people cannot be all, and always, well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented, in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive. If they remain quiet under such misconceptions, it is lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty. … And what country can preserve its liberties, if it’s rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to the facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.”

— Thomas Jefferson

“No one ever dies wishing they’d spent more time at the office.”

— Malcom Forbes

“Sometimes you have to give up who your are to become who you can be.”

— Blaine Taylor

“He has achieved success who has lived well, laughed often and loved much; who has enjoyed the trust of pure women, the respect of intelligent men and the love of little children; who has filled his niche and accomplished his task; who has left the world better than he found it, whether by an improved poppy, a perfect poem or a rescued soul; who has never lacked appreciation of Earth’s beauty or failed to express it; who has always looked for the best in others and given them the best he had; whose life was an inspiration; who’s memory a benediction.”

— Bessie Anderson Stanley

“Yesterday’s the past, tomorrow’s the future, but today is a GIFT. That’s why it’s called the present.”

— Bill Keane

“Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

— Luke 6:31

“Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.”

I started this blog in 2006 to talk about local politics, specifically Norfolk politics. It is impossible to talk about Norfolk in a vacuum, so you'll also find some regional, state, and national politics. And sometimes, no politics at all.

The inspiration for this blog comes from one of Virginia's most respected forefathers:

"I know no safe depositary of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education. This is the true corrective of abuses of constitutional power."

Thomas Jefferson, 1820

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